Result of a perfectly achieved collaboration between Urban Decay and the singer Gwen Stefani, the new eyeshadow palette from the brand is just divine. Whether you’re embracing your beaustista status or you’re getting the hang of doing your makeup, you can only be seduced by this palette. The 15 eyeshadows that compose it, while only 12 being exclusive, have been carefully selected by the star, moreover, their names are inspired by the life and the musical journey of Gwen Stefani.

At first glance, the palette might seem a bit conventional, and not really revolutionary (seeing the promotional pictures, I swore to myself that I wasn’t going to splurge on yet another neutral palette), but when getting a closer look at it in store, I realised that this palette was everyting someone could need on a day to day basis and would rapidly become one of my beauty staples. The colours that are included in this palette allow you not only to create natural and luminous everyday makeup looks but also to turn up the volume and create sophisticated or colourful evening looks. In brief, this palette – from the packaging to the shadows it contains – is the interpretation of the iconic “classic glam” look sprinkled with the emblematic rock’n’roll touch from Gwen Stefani, signed by Urban Decay.

The shadows under the scope:

Blonde: Pale beige with pink iridescent shift, ideal as a soft highlighter for a daytime look. Place the product under the brow bone and in the inner corner of the eyes.

Bathwater: Pale beige with gold pearl. More intense than its predecessor, this eyeshadow will beautifuly enlighten any nighttime makeup.

Skimp: Pale nude satin. Discrete and matching light skin tones, it’s the perfect shade to blend darker shadows that are placed into the crease of the eye.

Punk: Reddish brown matte. If there’s a shade that speaks directly to my hart, it’s this one. Because we never have enough warm browns to give some dimension to our makeup, I mainly use this one on my outer V and under the eyes.

Baby: Cool metallic rose. This shadow is to green eyes what “Steady” is to blues: the perfect metallic highlight to bring out emerald beauties. Use without caution, day or night!

Anaheim: Light taupe-brown matte. It’s the perfect transition shade for cool toned makeup. Apply the shadow in the crease of the eye: place your brush where you want the most intensity of colour to be first, then blend it through the crease for a soft gradient effect.

Stark: Nude-pink matte. Going for a natural romantic look? This old pink is the shadow you need!

Serious: Smokey grey with iridescent floating pearl. Smokey eye you said? Emphasise the smokiness of your eye makeup with this shade which will subtly diffuse an audacious black.

Pop: Pale coral with iridescent sparkle. This is the most difficult shade to use. Just by swatching it, the shadow crumbles and creates fall out. To apply this shade, forget your brushes! Obtain optimum results by applying with your fingers, layering the shadow over a coral cream base like “Rubenesque” from M.A.C. or even the “Glitter Glue” by Too Faced.

Harajuku: Metallic blue-pink w/iridescent micro-shimmer. I was quite scared to use this shadow because I usually don’t like pink colours on my lids. So I opted for an unconventional pink inner corner highlight, giving a touch of colour and peps to my neutral day to day makeup.

Danger: Deep metallic royal blue with blue micro-sparkle. This eyeshadow is simply stunning and will make for gorgeous, bright and colourful smokey eyes.

1987: Bright metallic yellow-gold. There’s no classic glam’ without including a gold shade: with its yellow undertones this one will do wonders on all skintones!

Blackout: Black matte. A black shadow is a staple of any palette, and the pigmentation of this one is just on point!

Overall, I find the pigmentation and longevity of the shadows to be in line with the quality of the brand’s other products. Most of the shadows apply and blend really easily, to the exception of “Pop” which is powdery, creates some major fall out and therefore is difficult to work with.

Because good things come in pairs, samples of Gwen’s new lipsticks, which will be released in 2016 are offered in the box. For my part, I can’t wait to have a swatch session with the blush palette, the brow palette, the lipsticks and lip pencils which will be added to the collection.